Arno Grønhovd, Norway and Petteri Hakala, Finland are joint leaders of the Open class at the end of the first day of the two-day PreO competition at Espoo, Finland. Spaniard Alejandro Aguilar Lara leads the P class by a small margin.
High scores were the order of the day, with 41 competitors making no or only 1 mistake on the 25-control course. So all was dependent on the timed controls, and these proved to be hard, with many mistakes made. But with so many on high scores, a particularly intense competition is anticipated tomorrow.
It was a day of intermittent rain, but never so heavy that competitors were affected in making their decisions, so the conditions and terrain visibility were similar for everyone.
Finland, Norway and Sweden dominated the leading Open class positions, the first athlete not from these 3 countries amongst the top eight being Kreso Kerestes, Slovenia in fourth place. By contrast the P (Physically Challenged) class had 5 different nations represented in the top 6. Here, the four leading competitors had 23 points and are separated by time plus any penalties at the timed controls.
Tomorrow the second day of the PreO event takes place from the same venue but in hillier terrain.
Leading results, PreO Day 1
O class
1= Arno Grønhovd NOR & Petteri Hakala FIN 25 points + 29 secs.
- Jens Andersson SWE 25 + 40
- Krešo Keresteš SLO 25 + 41
- William Rex SWE 25 + 59
- Pinja Mäkinen FIN 25 + 87
P class
- Alejandro Aguilar Lara ESP 23 + 28
- Michael Johansson SWE 23 + 80
- Søren Saxtorph DEN 23 + 135
- Ola Jansson SWE 23 + 172
- Vladyslav Vovk UKR 21 + 116
- Pekka Seppä FIN 21 + 129